29th
Eureka! The moment when everything falls into place. The light bulb goes on. Everything is clear. You leap out of the bath and run down the street naked.
When you’re writing and you want a reader to grasp a theory or concept that’s hard to explain, don’t try to explain it. Instead, talk about specific, important problems that the theory can solve. And get them to think about specific relevant situations that will plant the theory in their head for them.
Your readers might not be as smart as Archimedes – you might need to help them a long a bit with some explanation. But explanation is always easier if you talk about relevant important problems and concrete situations first.
Eureka happens when a new theory appears in your head. Probably not new to the world, but new to you. A theory or concept that explains a lot but eluded you before.
Archimedes had been thinking about a specific problem for a while (how to precisely measure the volume of irregular coins). It was a problem that he cared about, and wanted to solve… because it would make it easy to catch forgeries. Specific, concrete, and important to him. He wasn’t looking for a general theory.
Archimedes was taking a specific action when the theory came to him. It was an (accidental) experiment that lead to the theory. Taking that specific action and seeing the result lead to a cascade of reasoning that – in the blink of an eye – formed a complete theory in his head.
And then he ran down the road starkers.
Nobody explained the theory to him. It arrived complete in his head because of concrete situations.
So go ahead and try to create Eureka moments in your own writing. It’s all about choosing the right problems and situations, and encouraging the reader to think about them.